This thesis covers the concepts of God in the traditional faith of Meru people but the background goes back to African traditional religion in general. Meru is located at the eastern part of Mount Kenya. The work begins with a literature review and field based on oral tradition, which indicates that Meru people came from northern Africa, moved to Canaan, Meroe, (south of Egypt) Meru-Arusha, Mombasa, and finally through Tana River to their present land. The Meru people also claim that they came along with all Bantus speaking communities in Eastern, Southern, and Central Africa. The thesis has seven chapters. The first one covers introduction and background, followed by the research plan and methodology (chapter two) Literature review (chapter three). The fourth chapter outlines the geography, migration and the various stages of becoming a human being. That fifth chapter consists of Meru traditional government and specialists. The sixth one describes the concepts of the Supreme Being in Meru traditional religion. The seventh chapter discusses the interaction of Meru traditional religion with Christianity and its implications. / Systematic Theology and Theological Ethics / M.Th. (Systematic Theology)

本研究主要透過調查法，以ASUS與SONY筆記型電腦為例，以「品牌屬性」為自變數，「信心」與「抵抗性」做為中介變數、「個人因素」為調節變數，探討其對依變數「品牌共鳴」的影響，藉由比較台灣自創品牌與國外品牌在品牌共鳴的表現上是否有差異之處，造成差異的關鍵因素為何？期望協助台灣企業找出自己的品牌之路，站上國際舞台。 本研究主要的研究目的有三：（1） 探討影響「品牌共鳴」程度高低的主要原因；（2）探討消費者對品牌屬性重要性的認知，是否會影響其信心和抵抗性，進而影響到品牌共鳴；（3）探討個人因素對品牌共鳴的影響。 研究結果發現：(1) 在筆記型電腦產業，功能性與情感性屬性皆會影響信心，但唯有情感性屬性對抵抗性有影響。(2)情感性屬性是影響筆記型電腦品牌共鳴的關鍵因素。(3) 自我表現消費動機、性別差異對筆記型電腦使用者的信心沒有影響。(4)「自我表現消費動機高者」與「產品知識高者」社群感最強。(5) 筆電族群中，若欲加強重視情感性屬性之消費者之信心，要從產品知識下手。

Darbe nagrinėjama atributinės informacijos sertifikavimo šiuo metu naudojamuose elektroniniuse parašuose problema. Trumpai apžvelgiami elektroninio parašo principai ir supažindinama su viešųjų raktų infrastruktūra, nurodant galimybes jai išplėsti, iškilus poreikiui užtikrinti aukštesnį saugumo lygį keičiantis papildoma (atributine) informacija. Nagrinėjami įvairūs atributinės informacijos sertifikavimo metodai, viešųjų raktų infrastruktūroje įvedant atributų sertifikato ir atributų sertifikavimo centro sąvokas. Pateikiamas tinkamiausio metodo pritaikymo pavyzdys, modeliuojant elektroninio parašo naudojimo situaciją, artimą dabartinei situacijai Lietuvoje. Sprendimo pritaikymas demonstruojamas apibrėžiant patobulintos elektroninio parašo infrastruktūros prototipą. / This paper analyses issues of attribute certification in currently used electronic signatures. Fundamentals of electronic signatures and public key infrastructure are briefly described, focusing on possibilities of achieving higher security level in communication when attribute information is important. Various suggestions for attribute certification are analysed, introducing atribute certificates and atribute authorities. Different certification methods are compared and evaluated, applying the most suitable one in the public key infrastructure usage model, that is constructed by simplifying the current situation of electronic signatures. The solution is represented by describing the prototype of improved electronic signature infrastructure.

La capture contingente de l’attention est un phénomène dans lequel les mécanismes d’orientation endogène et exogène de l’attention interagissent, de sorte qu’une propriété qui est pertinente à la tâche en cours, et donc qui fait l’objet de contrôles attentionnels descendants, endogènes, capture l’attention de façon involontaire, exogène, vers sa position spatiale. Dans cette thèse, trois aspects de ce phénomène ont été étudiés. Premièrement, en explorant le décours temporel de la capture contingente de l’attention et la réponse électrophysiologique à des distracteurs capturant ainsi l’attention, il a été établi que le déficit comportemental symptomatique de cette forme de capture était lié à un déploiement de l’attention visuospatiale vers la position du distracteur, et que ce traitement spatialement sélectif pouvait être modulé par le partage d’autres propriétés entre le distracteur et la cible. Deuxièmement, l’utilisation des potentiels liés aux événements a permis de dissocier l’hypothèse de capture contingente de l’attention et l’hypothèse de capture pure de l’attention. Selon cette interprétation, un stimulus ne peut capturer l’attention aux stades préattentifs de traitement que s’il présente le plus fort signal ascendant parmi tous les stimuli présents. Les contrôles attentionnels descendants ne serviraient donc qu’à désengager l’attention d’un tel stimulus. Les résultats présentés ici vont à l’encontre d’une telle interprétation, puisqu’un déploiement de l’attention visuospatiale, indexé par la présence d’une N2pc, n’a été observé que lorsqu’un distracteur périphérique possédait une caractéristique pertinente à la tâche en cours, même lorsque ses propriétés de bas niveau n’étaient pas plus saillantes que celles des autres items présents. Finalement, en utilisant un paradigme où la cible était définie en fonction de son appartenance à une catégorie alphanumérique, il a été démontré que des contrôles attentionnels en faveur d’un attribut conceptuel pouvaient guider l’attention visuospatiale de façon involontaire, rejetant une nouvelle fois l’hypothèse de la capture pure de l’attention. / Contingent involuntary orienting is a phenomenon in which endogenous and exogenous attentional mechanisms interact, such that an item captures attention only if it shares an attribute that is relevant for the task at hand. Hence, top-down attentional control settings are established endogenously in favour of the relevant attribute, but stimuli sharing this attribute draw attention to their location involuntarily. The present thesis explores three aspects of this phenomenon. First, by studying the time course of this contingent capture effect, and by measuring event-related potentials (ERPs) to capturing distractors, it has been established that the performance deficits linked to contingent capture are in fact due to a deployment of visuospatial attention to the location of the distractor. Moreover, this spatially selective processing of the capturing distractor can be modulated if the distractor shares another target attribute, beside the target defining attribute. The ERP technique also permitted the dissociation of the contingent involuntary orienting hypothesis and the pure capture with brief attentional dwell time hypothesis. According to the latter interpretation, only salient singletons have the ability to capture attention at preattentive stages of processing. Therefore, top-down attentional control settings serve only to disengage attention from the location of such singletons when they do not share target features. The present results argue against this interpretation, because a deployment of visuospatial attention, indexed by the presence of the N2pc, was observed only in response to peripheral distractors sharing the target-defining attribute, even when all items in the stimulus displays were equated in terms of bottom-up salience. Lastly, when alphanumeric category was used to define the target, it was shown that top-down attentional control settings in favour of such conceptual attributes could be successfully implemented and used to guide visuospatial attention in an exogenous fashion, providing further evidence against the pure capture hypothesis.

Les Moments ont été largement utilisés dans la reconnaissance de formes et dans le traitement d'image. Dans cette thèse, nous concentrons notre attention sur les 3D moments orthogonaux de Gauss-Hermite, les moments invariants 2D et 3D de Gauss-Hermite, l'algorithme rapide de l'attribut de cohérence et les applications de l'interprétation sismique en utilisant la méthode des moments.Nous étudions les méthodes de suivi automatique d'horizon sismique à partir de moments de Gauss-Hermite en cas de 1D et de 3D. Nous introduisons une approche basée sur une étude multi-échelle des moments invariants. Les résultats expérimentaux montrent que la méthode des moments 3D de Gauss-Hermite est plus performante que les autres algorithmes populaires.Nous avons également abordé l'analyse des faciès sismiques basée sur les caractéristiques du vecteur à partir des moments 3D de Gauss -Hermite, et la méthode de Cartes Auto-organisatrices avec techniques de visualisation de données. L'excellent résultat de l'analyse des faciès montre que l'environnement intégré donne une meilleure performance dans l'interprétation de la structure des clusters.Enfin, nous introduisons le traitement parallèle et la visualisation de volume. En profitant des nouvelles performances par les technologies multi-threading et multi-cœurs dans le traitement et l'interprétation de données sismiques, nous calculons efficacement des attributs sismiques et nous suivons l'horizon. Nous discutons également l'algorithme de rendu de volume basé sur le moteur Open-Scene-Graph qui permet de mieux comprendre la structure de données sismiques. / Moments have been extensively used in pattern recognition and image processing. In this thesis, we focus our attention on the study of 3D orthogonal Gaussian-Hermite moments, 2D and 3D Gaussian-Hermite moment invariants, fast algorithm of coherency attribute, and applications of seismic interpretation using moments methodology.We conduct seismic horizon auto-tracking methods from Gaussian-Hermite moments and moment invariants. We introduce multi-scale moment invariants approach. The experimental results show that method of 3D Gaussian-Hermite moments performs better than the most popular methods.We also approach seismic facies analysis based on feature vectors from 3D Gaussian-Hermite moments, and Self-Organizing Maps method with data visualization techniques. The excellent result shows that the integrated environment gives the best performance in interpreting the correct cluster structure.Finally, we introduce the parallel processing and volume visualization. Taking advantage of new performances by multi-threading and multi-cores technologies into seismic interpretation, we efficiently compute the seismic attributes and track the horizon. We also discuss volume rendering algorithm based on Open-Scene-Graph engine which provides better insight into the structure of seismic data.

Num mundo de difusão de imagens, por meios eletrônicos ou gráficos, onde conceitos, mensagens (publicidade comercial, estatal e política) e acontecimentos (por exemplo, no jornalismo) são mostrados, o direito humano à imagem é colocado à prova, pois detentores do direito reclamam do seu uso indevido. Para o Direito, algumas questões mostram-se relevantes, à medida que se busca a tutela do direito à imagem. O que é a imagem de uma pessoa? O que é imagem retrato e imagem atributo? Existe uma representação de grupo, imagem do grupo? Um determinado grupo pode reclamar direito à imagem? Quais as características de tal direito? Se imagens divulgadas (ex: imagens transmitidas pelas ondas eletromagnéticas) informam características fenotípicas de raça e cor, há uma imagem retrato das pessoas da cor/raça negra? Como os negros (as) querem ser representados na mídia? A pesquisa empírica mostra que as pessoas querem ser representadas na mídia com respeito. Tal postura comporta uma compreensão das pessoas como seres únicos, com suas próprias características. / In a world broadcast images, electronically or graphs, where concepts, messages (commercial advertising, political and state) and events (eg, journalism) are shown, the human right to the image is put to the test, as holders of rights complain about its misuse. To the Right, some questions show up relevant, as it seeks the protection of the right to the image. What is the image of a person? What is portrait image and image attribute? There is a group representation, group picture? A particular group can claim any rights to the image? What are the characteristics of such a right? If images released (eg images transmitted by electromagnetic waves) inform phenotypic characteristics of race and color, there is a portrait of people of color / black race image? How blacks want to be represented in the media? Empirical research shows that people want to be represented in the media with respect. This attitude involves an understanding of people as unique individuals with their own characteristics.

依據資策會市場情報中心的統計，1997 年我國資訊硬體工業海內外的總產值已達 302 億美元，成長率達 24.8%，顯示台灣的資訊硬體工業佔世界市場--主要的地位。資訊硬體工業在我國發展相當成功，其發展歷程與分工方式值得探討，而更值得注意的是，資訊產業 廠商如何能在變動快速的外界環境條件下，運用組織內外部的資源不斷的進行知識吸收、創造與擴散。 本研究由「組織為知識流動、創造與蓄積的載體」的角度出發，試圖在本土優秀廠商組織能耐持續深化的過程中，歸納出台灣資訊硬體工業的組織知識創造模式，藉以發掘台灣獨特 (Taiwan-specific) 的競爭優勢。主要研究問題包括：(1) 技術特質如何影響組織知識流通？(2) 團隊領導與組織情境如何影響組織知識流通？(3) 臺灣資訊硬體業特有的創新模式與組織知識流通模式為何？ 本研究採個案研究法，共訪問六家廠商，主要研究結論如下： (一) 技術特質不同，組織知識流通隨之不同 (1)路徑相依度：本研究發現當路徑相依度低時，知識吸收將較依賴外界的知識來源，知識創造過程中的團隊自主性將較高。反之，當路徑相依度高時，知識吸收將較依賴內部的知識來源，知識創造過程中的團隊自主性將較低。 (2)模組化程度：本研究發現當模組化程度高時，知識吸收將傾向分散式的知識交流網路，知識創造過程中成員間的分工較清楚，而且團隊創造的知識較能以模組的形式儲存擴散。反之，當路徑相依度高時，知識吸收將傾向集中式的知識交流網路，知識創造過程中成員間的分工較難切割清楚，而且團隊創造的知識較無法以模組的形式儲存擴散。 (3)技術複雜程度 本研究發現當技術複雜度較高時，知識吸收的來源較廣泛，知識創造過程中的團隊多樣性與正式化程度將較高，而且知識愈傾向於以外顯方式蓄積擴散。反之，當技術複雜度較低時，知識吸收的來源較狹隘，知識創造過程中的團隊多樣性與正式化程度將較低，而且知識愈傾向於以內隱方式蓄積擴散。 (二) 團隊領導與組織情境不同，組織知識流通隨之不同 本研究發現師徒制是台灣資訊硬體公司重要的訓練制度，專案的知識儲存方式因此傾向蓄積於個人之上，本研究亦歸納出不同形式的專案領導人對於組織知識流通影響的角度不同。此外，當個人激勵與團隊績效連結程度愈高時，愈有助於知識創造過程中的團隊合作程度，而且當組織各個團隊間的正式與非正式溝通較頻繁時，則有助於內部知識擴散，較能發揮整體組織知識的槓桿效果。 (三) 台灣資訊硬體業的創新特色 從個案的實地探索之中，本研究依據 Henderson and Clark (1990) 提出的學習模式，發現在替先進國廠商的代工經驗中，台灣逐漸吸取了先進國產品設計與製造的知識，因此近年來，雖然關鍵組件多操控在日商與美商的手裡，但是許多台灣優秀的廠商則試圖在產品架構方面進行創新，亦即在整體搭配方面進行突破，設法讓整個產品成本降低或功能提昇，這種現象可見於筆記型電腦產業、掃描器產業、CD-ROM 產業、Monitor，產業等。依據以上的觀察，本研究歸納出台灣資訊硬體業的創新特色是屬於架構方面的創新，對於關鍵組件的創新能力則相對較弱。此外，本研究同時發現本土廠商由於規模較小，因此很難像歐美廠商般以總部的中央貧驗室來進行長期的研發，所以主要扮演的角色為快速的追隨者．，負責盡快將新技術商品化，而透過上下游跨組織的知識流通使得我國廠商能在快速追隨者的定位上持續保有競爭力。

關於供應商評選模式的探討與研究，是現今於供應鏈管理中非常重要的議題，而對於國內外供應商評選的相關性研究中，往往只考量供應商本身績效，而缺乏整體性的考量，有鑑於此，當企業在評選供應商時，不僅是針對單一供應商績效的考量，而對於供應商本身上下游廠商的整體績效的考量，也是相當重要的評選因素。本研究運用資料包絡分析法(Data Envelopment Analysis, DEA)與簡易多屬性評等技術(Simple Multi-Attribute Rating, SMART)，以建構較完整的供應商評選模式，協助企業的決策者選擇最適的供應商。 在進行供應商與供應商所屬的供應鏈之績效評估時，利用資料包絡分析法中的交叉模式計算供應商與供應商所屬的供應鏈之平均效率，再藉由平均效率值以排序供應商與供應商所屬的供應鏈之優先順位，但因兩者之順序會產生不一致的情形，利用SMART法中的排序加總法計算兩者之權重值，最後以加總法計算綜合效率值，依據綜合效率值加以排序以評選最適的供應商，而此兩種方法的結合， 則需透過驗證的方式以確定運用之正確性，利用系統動力學(System Dynamics, SD)以建構供應鏈之整體廠商的經營環境，模擬供應鏈整體廠商之績效評估模式，以產生模擬驗證排序，最後再將綜合排序與驗證排序，利用Spearman等級相關係數驗證其相關性，而最終證明兩排序具有高度相關性，也證實本研究所提出的供應商評選模式富有參考價值。 / The research of supplier selection model is a very important issue in supply chain management (SCM). Even though the research on supplier selection is abundant, the most works usually only consider the performance of the supplier. This situation can result in a lack of integral deliberation. Therefore, the decision-maker wants to select his vendor in the company, it is important that the decision-maker not only focus on the business unit but also add to the overall organization of the supply chain. In this paper the Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) and the Simple Multi-Attribute Rating (SMART) are developed to construct the effective supplier evaluation model depends upon the constituent parts of the supply chain, which may be helpful for selecting the appropriate vendor. When evaluating the performance of the supplier and the supplier’s supply chain, the cross-efficiency model of DEA is applied to compute average efficiency both the supplier and the supply chain. According to average efficiency, we can arrange the priority order that may be have the inconsistent order for the suppliers and their supply chains. The rank sum weighting of SMART is employed to determine the weights of suppliers and their chains and then the weighted method is used to calculate overall efficiency that ranking of the suppliers is obtained. Above of two methods, we must be verify the model. The System Dynamics (SD) is designed to implement the whole components of the supply chain for business environment and simulate the performance model. Based on this performance model, we can acquire a confirmation list. In the end, the Spearman’s rank correlation coefficient is provided to testify the correlation between the overall order and the confirmation list. The result of the statistic analysis is illustrated the strength of the association. The model can be tailored and applied by firms that are making decisions on supplier selection.

Elements of continuous variation such as tremolo, vibrato and portamento enable dimensions of their own in expressive melodic music in styles such as in Indian Classical Music. There is published work on parametrically modeling some of these elements individually, and to apply the modeled parameters to automatically generated musical notes in the context of machine musicianship, using simple rule-based mappings. There have also been many systems developed for generative musical accompaniment using probabilistic models of discrete musical elements such as MIDI notes and durations, many of them inspired by computational research in linguistics. There however doesn't seem to have been a combined approach of parametrically modeling expressive elements in a probabilistic framework. This documents presents a real-time computational framework that uses a multi-attribute trie / n-gram structure to model parameters like frequency, depth and/or lag of the expressive variations such as vibrato and portamento, along with conventionally modeled elements such as musical notes, their durations and metric positions in melodic audio input. This work proposes storing the parameters of expressive elements as metadata in the individual nodes of the traditional trie structure, along with the distribution of their probabilities of occurrence. During automatic generation of music, the expressive parameters as learned in the above training phase are applied to the associated re-synthesized musical notes. The model is aimed at being used to provide automatic melodic accompaniment in a performance scenario. The parametric modeling of the continuous expressive elements in this form is hypothesized to be able to capture deeper temporal relationships among musical elements and thereby is expected to bring about a more expressive and more musical outcome in such a performance than what has been possible using other works of machine musicianship using only static mappings or randomized choice. A system was developed on Max/MSP software platform with this framework, which takes in a pitched audio input such as human singing voice, and produces a pitch track which may be applied to synthesized sound of a continuous timbre. The system was trained and tested with several vocal recordings of North Indian Classical Music, and a subjective evaluation of the resulting audio was made using an anonymous online survey. The results of the survey show the output tracks generated from the system to be as musical and expressive, if not more, than the case where the pitch track generated from the original audio was directly rendered as output, and also show the output with expressive elements to be perceivably more expressive than the version of the output without expressive parameters. The results further suggest that more experimentation may be required to conclude the efficacy of the framework employed in relation to using randomly selected parameter values for the expressive elements. This thesis presents the scope, context, implementation details and results of the work, suggesting future improvements.

Das Ziel dieser Arbeit ist es die mathematische Theorie der Begriffsalgebren zu entwickeln. Wir betrachten dabei hauptsaechlich das Repraesentationsproblem dieser vor Kurzem eingefuehrten Strukturen. Motiviert durch die Suche nach einer geeigneten Negation sind die Begriffsalgebren entstanden. Sie sind nicht nur fuer die Philosophie oder die Wissensrepraesentation von Interesse, sondern auch fuer andere Felder, wie zum Beispiel Logik oder Linguistik. Das Problem Negationen geeignet einzufuehren, ist sicher eines der aeltesten der wissenschaftlichen oder philosophischen Gemeinschaft und erregt auch zur Zeit die Aufmerksamkeit vieler Wissenschaftler. Verschiedene Typen von Logik (die sich sehr stark durch die eigefuehrte Negation unterscheiden) unterstreichen die Wichtigkeit dieser Untersuchungen. In dieser Arbeit beschaeftigen wir uns hauptsaechlich mit der kontextuellen Logik, eine Herangehensweise der Formalen Begriffsanalyse, basierend auf der Idee, den Begriff als Einheit des Denkens aufzufassen. / The aim of this investigation is to develop a mathematical theory of concept algebras. We mainly consider the representation problem for this recently introduced class of structures. Motivated by the search of a "negation" on formal concepts, "concept algebras" are of considerable interest not only in Philosophy or Knowledge Representation, but also in other fields as Logic or Linguistics. The problem of negation is surely one of the oldest problems of the scientific and philosophic community, and still attracts the attention of many researchers. Various types of Logic (defined according to the behaviour of the corresponding negation) can attest this affirmation. In this thesis we focus on "Contextual Logic", a Formal Concept Analysis approach, based on concepts as units of thought.